1. Field
The present invention relates generally to wireless communications, and more specifically to display format for handheld wireless communication devices.
2. Background
Handheld wireless communication devices, for example, a wireless personal digital assistant (PDA), a wireless handheld computer, and a wireless web-enabled cellphone, have a small elongated rectangular display screen mounted on the front wall of the housing of the device. The viewing orientation on the display screen is typically in a vertically elongated orientation, also called a “portrait” orientation. In the portrait orientation, the image on the display screen is greater in dimension in the vertical direction than it is in the horizontal direction. Some applications, however, are visually handicapped by the narrow display width of the portrait-oriented display screen.
Handheld wireless communication devices can access web sites designed for displaying web pages on monitors of desktop computers or laptop computers. These websites are referred to as standard web sites, and their web pages are referred to as standard web pages. Handheld wireless communication devices also can access web sites designed for displaying web pages on a display screen of a handheld wireless communication device. These websites are referred to as a wireless portal, and their web pages are referred to as wireless web pages. The web pages are typically designed with more text and little graphic to facilitate a quick download over slow wireless links. As the speed of wireless links improve, for example, with certain versions of cdma2000 and third-generation systems, the content of wireless web pages will increase. Nevertheless, the wireless web pages will be designed for display on the display screen.
Some web sites contain web pages that are dynamically generated for both monitors of desktop or laptop computers and display screens of wireless communication devices. Typically, the web site determines if the wireless communication device's browser is designed for displaying images on a display screen of a wireless communication device, and then sends a downsized version of the web page (the wireless web page), rather than the full content of a standard web page, when the web site determines that the browser is designed for a wireless communication device.
There are numerous conventional Web browsers for handheld wireless communication devices that are portrait oriented, for example, AvantGo™ brand browser by AvantGo, Web Whacker™ brand browser by Blue Squirrel, Pocket Browser™ brand browser by Conduits Technologies, Pocket IE™ brand browser by Microsoft, EudoraWeb™ brand browser by Qualcomm, and Whack Force™ brand browser by Ruksun Software Technologies.
When a wireless portal is accessed, it would be better to display the wireless web page on the portrait-oriented display screen because the wireless web page is formatted for the size of the display screen. When a standard web page is viewed on a portrait-oriented display screen, however, only a corner of the wireless web page is shown. This is due to the difference in size between the screen display of the handheld device and the monitor of the desktop computer. The viewed corner is in a portrait orientation rather than the landscape orientation typical of monitors of desktop computers or laptop computers. The user might find it inconvenient to browse the standard web page because of the scrolling, especially in the horizontal direction, to view the entire standard web page.
Presenting the standard web page on a landscape-orientated display screen would be more convenient because the landscape orientation allows the device to fit more of the standard web page in the horizontal direction. In a “landscape” orientation, the viewing orientation of the image on the display screen is in a horizontally elongated orientation, and the image on the display screen is greater in dimension in the horizontal direction than it is in the vertical direction. In the landscape orientation, the image aspect ratio and the display screen orientation are better matched than in the portrait orientation. Because standard web pages are designed to be scrolled vertically, the landscape display of standard web pages helps in preserving the context of the standard web page and reducing scrolling in the horizontal direction.
Landscape-oriented browsers are known, for example, ThunderHawk™ browser by Bitstream, which approximate the experience of a desktop browser by providing a landscape orientation for the display of images. In addition, the standard web page is reformatted to fit partially within the display screen in the landscape orientation. Some of this formatting is performed on a proxy server and may include resizing the font of text and reducing the size of images before transmitting the reformatted web page to the wireless communication device.